Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke needs to start tapering down the central bank's extraordinary stimulus measures. His $85-billion-a-month bond-buying program has been pouring money into the economy all year.

Bernanke is running out of excuses for such easy-money policies. The Fed may finally acknowledge that Wednesday, when its policy-setting, open-market committee is scheduled to wrap up a two-day meeting. We hope the Fed finally winds down its spending.

Eventually, the Fed will have to reduce its balance sheet (now nearly $4 trillion) to more normal levels (less than $1 trillion). Eventually — with any luck, beginning Wednesday — the Fed will embark on a very tricky exit strategy.

No one is sure what will happen when the Fed starts to offload the trillions of dollars in securities it has piled up. Interest rates, which the Fed has suppressed, very likely will rise. The dollar, which the Fed has kept weak, stands to strengthen. Higher rates and a stronger dollar could drag down growth. That in turn could send markets tumbling.

Markets do tumble. Between the end of 2007 and early 2009, the stock market lost half its value. Since then, stocks have more than doubled to reach record highs. The Dow Jones industrial average has shot up 20 percent so far this year. Some indexes of market performance have done even better.

The stock and Treasury markets took a hit earlier this year when many investors anticipated that the Fed would start to taper in September. The Fed's unexpected decision to retain its aggressive pro-growth policy triggered the biggest rally in Treasuries since 2011. It's hard to predict what the markets will do if the Fed finally follows through Wednesday, but the markets do seem to have anticipated such a move and they haven't tanked, probably because of the strengthening fundamentals of the economy.

Interest rates have started to climb. Banks are starting to lend as loan demand rises from small- and medium-sized businesses. That lack of demand has been a missing link in the economic recovery. We expect momentum to build in 2014. When banks feel confident about lending to small companies, and small companies feel the same about taking a risk by expanding with borrowed capital, jobs will be created at an ever-faster clip.

The markets have signaled that the economic outlook is strong enough to support a change in Fed policy. To an extent, expectations are being shaped by a change in leadership at the Fed. Bernanke's term expires at the end of January. Vice Chair Janet Yellen is poised to succeed him. She has made no new commitments about changing future policy.

If we were in her spot, we'd be more worried about the $4 trillion on her books than whether the markets go down on the day the Fed finally announces a plan to taper its stimulus. Yellen's tenure is likely to be judged by how well she manages the unprecedented challenge that Bernanke's policy has left to her.